


Handle With Care

by Tahlruil



Series: Fragile Things and Calloused Hands [2]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, De-Aged Tony Stark, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, How Do I Tag, POV Thor (Marvel), Possibly Pre-Slash, Thor (Marvel) Needs a Hug, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, eventually
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-22
Updated: 2018-10-22
Packaged: 2019-08-05 18:14:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16372607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tahlruil/pseuds/Tahlruil
Summary: "He had always had difficulty handling more fragile things.It was an instinct to hold them more closely and grip them tighter in an effort to keep themsafe. Even if his mind knew that he needed to handle them with care and caution, it was work to suppress that urge. All Thor had to do was take one look at his large, calloused hands cradling some precious trinket of his mother’s and something inside of him trembled. He wasn’t meant to deal in the delicate parts of life - he had been born of lightning and forged into a weapon meant to be used at his father’s will. Grace on a battlefield meant nothing when confronted with tiny cups that nestled into the palm of one hand or glass figurines carved so finely that they shivered in alarm if so much as the wind disturbed them. He had no place in his mother’s pretty parlors, and he had known that before his mouth was clever enough to form true words."





	Handle With Care

**Author's Note:**

> Uh, so I'm currently at an impasse of some kind in every single one of my other projects. I was actually staring at one of my Teen Wolf stories, trying to make things work, and then this happened instead? :'D
> 
> Will likely require some editing later - 'tis past my bedtime but I want to post it now 'cause I've got a root canal tomorrow and I want to get it up before the pain meds set in. XD
> 
> Thanks so much for reading! Comments are greatly appreciated. <3

He had always had difficulty handling more fragile things.

It was an instinct to hold them more closely and grip them tighter in an effort to keep them _safe_. Even if his mind knew that he needed to handle them with care and caution, it was work to suppress that urge. All Thor had to do was take one look at his large, calloused hands cradling some precious trinket of his mother’s and something inside of him trembled. He wasn’t meant to deal in the delicate parts of life - he had been born of lightning and forged into a weapon meant to be used at his father’s will. Grace on a battlefield meant nothing when confronted with tiny cups that nestled into the palm of one hand or glass figurines carved so finely that they shivered in alarm if so much as the wind disturbed them. He had no place in his mother’s pretty parlors, and he had known that before his mouth was clever enough to form true words.

She had still tried though, had worked so hard to instill some skill in navigating the realm she so effortlessly ruled. ‘Careful, my son,’ she had told him over and over. ‘Saving that cup from falling means nothing if you crush it in your hands.’ Had he been more observant, more able to divine her many meanings, he might have noticed the way her eyes always traveled to his brother. Maybe if he hadn’t allowed his embarrassment at his ineptitude to make him so dismissive of his mother’s lessons, things could have been different.

Loki had both shattered _and_ fallen in the end.

A large part of the blame for that he took on his shoulders. He had never seen the way his brother was fracturing under his ham-handed care. Time and again, he had refused to acknowledge that his brother belonged half in the same world as their mother had made her own. His refusal to understand that and his fear at what it would mean for their relationship had turned him unthinkingly cruel. Jokes that he had found funny cut Loki like a knife; tricks Loki meant harmlessly were treated as mortal offenses because they were counter to his own nature.

He had fought so hard to keep his brother close, to make him something other than what he had been born to be. In the end the truth was simple: Loki’s strength was not his own. His brother had been a beautiful, intricately shaped work of art that Thor struggled to make any sense of. It made him no less deadly, but he had required a different kind of affection than Thor’s battle-minded friends.

Tony Stark had always reminded him of his brother. They possessed the same biting wit and tendency towards making light of serious matters. Warriors they were not, at least not in the traditional sense of the word. Certainly they fought well and caused their foes to quake in fear at their might, he would never deny that. But where Thor, Sif and the Warriors Three had been meant for the battlefield by right of birth, Loki and Tony had carved their way there through sweat, blood, and ingenuity.

Both inspired a sense of awe when he really looked at them and thought of what they had accomplished. They were both of them fragile in a way that Thor knew he wasn’t - his own weaknesses were different. He had misjudged his relationship and interactions with Loki so badly, and he had desperately hoped not to do the same when it came to Tony.

But even when he remembered not to hold things too tightly to keep them safe, Thor had never been good at dealing with the more delicate things in life.

_”You said you would tell me the truth.”_

Tony had gotten very good at creating things that could withstand the might of the Avengers. It had taken many cracked screens and broken controllers, but eventually they all had phones, StarkPads and other gadgets that could hold up under the abuse heaped upon them by superheroes. That meant they could be dropped, thrown, stepped on or even shot with arrows or bullets and they would not break.

_”You_ promised _and you… you said warriors never break their vows to each other.”_

Maybe it should make him feel better, the way his StarkPad remained whole and undamaged where it sat on the floor. It didn’t though. Not when it was so easy to keep the damned thing intact.

_”I thought you were my friend. You sang for me and… and…”_

Thor in fact hated that the electronic device dared be so unchanged by what had happened. Even if Tony hadn’t been able to throw it that hard, it still should have come apart at the seems. Everything had gone downhill so fast that Thor hadn’t been able to grasp his wits firmly in time, hadn’t understood what was happening until it was too late.

Water pooling in wounded brown eyes had stopped him cold, while the combined hurt and resignation in Tony’s voice had been like one of Loki’s daggers to the heart. He had been so sure that Tony would be thrilled and excited, that he would love to learn the truth of who he was… and he had very clearly miscalculated a delicate situation. The boy hadn’t even looked at the videos Thor had worked to compile with JARVIS, just stared up at him in the manner of one betrayed.

_”Why are you… why are you making fun of me?”_

Tony had heaved the StarkPad against the wall and run, shielded by JARVIS in an elevator before Thor could do more than get to his feet. The AI had assured him that he would look after Tony and try to soothe him. JARVIS would help the boy dry his own tears and then carefully bring him around to the idea that he would grow up to be Iron Man.

It hurt, dug at his own weaknesses, to know that a program - even one designed by Tony himself - knew how to navigate the situation better than he did. He had meant to give the boy that his Shield-Brother had become more control, more information. Instead he had caused only pain. Would he be allowed to say anything more later? Would he be allowed to give Tony a hug and apologize? If it stormed again that night, would Tony force himself to shake and whimper in his own bed instead of seeking Thor’s help?

The uncertainty gnawed at him. All he could do was wait and see if he had broken the fragile trust between them irreparably.

_”I never wanted the throne, I only ever wanted to be your equal!”_

_”Careful, my son.”_

_”I’m not scared and I’m not a baby.”_

_”I remember a shadow, living in the shade of your greatness.”_

_”Do not be afraid to be gentle dear boy - it won’t unman you to be tender, I promise.”_

_”Why are you making fun of me?”_

”I didn’t mean to,” he whispered both to thin air and two men so alike who weren’t even there to hear him. “I’m sorry.” Allowing the heaviness in his heart to weigh down his limbs, he collapsed back onto the couch and dropped his head into his hands. “I’ll do better, I swear it. If you’ll just give me another chance… I’ll do better.”

Silence alone answered him, and as fragile as it was even he couldn’t break it.

**Author's Note:**

> If any of you are waiting on my other stuff, it's coming honest! I'm just currently in anxiety-mode like, 90% of the time lately with the move and the new job, which makes it hard for me to let go of self-criticism enough to write. I'm gonna be a little loopy for the next day or so and that should get the juices going enough to get me over the humps... or at least let me convince myself that everything I've done isn't crap. XD


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